Rawlings’ Guessing Game

Jerry Rawlings leaving the NDC Congress on thursday

Eager Ghanaians who thought the appearance of ex-President Jerry John Rawlings at the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC's) special delegates' congress at the Baba Yara Stadium in Kumasi on Thursday, August 30, 2012, would end the massive cracks in the NDC were very disappointed when the NDC founder mounted the dais.

Once again, he kept the whole nation in suspense about whether not he was going to become a regular face in the affairs of the NDC or not. Whatever plans he had, he kept it close to his chest.

Rawlings was the curtain-raiser during the occasion that saw the whole country glued to their television screens.

The delegates' congress was to confirm the candidature of President John Mahama who automatically became the flagbearer of the NDC when the substantive flagbearer, John Evan Atta Mills, mysteriously died in office on June 24, 2012, at the time he said his doctors had given him a clean bill of health.

Throughout his 17-minute speech at the congress, the founder of the NDC, who has been virtually ostracized by the current leadership of the party, did not let out any clue on whether he was going to make amends with the current crop of NDC functionaries or not, even though some of them are very optimistic. He rather gave a tough condition which the party might not be able to meet.

Jerry Rawlings has been sidelined from many NDC functions since the party assumed the reins of power from the New Patriotic Party (NPP) in 2008. This is due to the serious reservations he had expressed about those he famously called 'greedy bastards' in the party, resulting in him being forced into a political sabbatical.

Even though his status as founder of the NDC naturally bestowed on him the chairman of the council of elders of the party, several important decisions have been taken recently on his blindside, naturally because of the caustic attacks he has aimed at the party hierarchy for the negative way he says they have conducted themselves.

The patriarch of the NDC, in frustration, had relegated himself to the background and was even linked to a breakaway party from the NDC, the National Democratic Party (NDP). It was therefore a pleasant surprise to many people when he accepted the invitation to speak at the historic congress.

Indeed, prior to the congress, several NDC stalwarts had gone to town announcing the turning point in their political fortune because the party's highly charismatic patriarch was back in a show of reconciliation. Bernard Allotey Jacobs, the Central Regional Propaganda Secretary of the NDC, was on radio excitedly assuring party supporters that the party was on the cusp of unity.

When he mounted the podium, ex-President Rawlings assumed his famous authority. He reprimanded the leadership of the NDC for maintaining those he described as 'bad nuts'. He thinks these people are responsible for eroding the prospects of the ruling party. In fact, his posture was a subtle re-enactment of his old sentiments.

He did not mince words when he was given the rare opportunity to speak at an NDC gathering post-2008. He gave several nuances about his apparent dissatisfaction with the current scheme of things in the NDC. “Fellow countrymen and women, Ghana is a country many were proud to die for. Can we say so under the prevailing political climate?' he asked rhetorically.

“It is crucial for us to reaffirm the party's values and commitments, to hold them up against hard reality and to truly assess what legacy we are bestowing to the next generations,' said Jerry Rawlings, reechoing his conviction that the current NDC government has deviated from the right ways of doing things. He had said severally that the government was heading to the abyss.

The NDC government is perhaps the most bashed in the Fourth Republic of by its own founder. It has also been at the receiving end of media and public anger for supervising several acts of corruption and mismanagement.

Jerry Rawlings is convinced that these acts are as a result of weak leadership and greed among certain power brokers in his party. So at the historic congress, he proposed the elimination of such people from their entrenched positions in the party.

Babies And Bathtubs
Jerry Rawlings described the negative forces in the NDC as the proverbial babies who have been universally accepted as not to be liable to be thrown away with the dirty bathwater because of the misconduct of the midwife. In a philosophical tone, he noted that unlike the proverbial babies, the ones he is describing in the NDC are an aberration. 'It is said that we should not throw out the baby with the bathwater, but what do we do when some of the babies in the tub are babies with teeth, biting and spewing invectives? Should they not be lowered out with the dirty water so we can concentrate on the good ones? After all one bad nut is all it takes to spoil the taste in your mouth,' Jerry Rawlings philosophized.

His speech was hardly devoid of his hard-line stance against alleged corrupt elements in the NDC. However, his tone was a lot more subtle this time than the usual whiplash tone he had used in the past when late President Evans Atta Mills was the leader of the party.

Jerry Rawlings, who is noted for his deep analogies, had used several other analogies in the past to describe the precarious position that the weak leadership of the NDC was allowing the 'greedy bastards' to put it in. He used euphemisms such as 'blind digger', 'dark abyss', 'sleepy bus driver' etc.

'For me, I think it showed some level of departure from his normal posturing,' notes Ransford Gyampoh, a political scientist at the University of Ghana, Legon.

Mr. Gyampoh told DAILY GUIDE , 'If you look at his posturing and his utterances on several platforms and you compare those utterances to yesterday's [Thursday] speech that he delivered, it looks as if he has toned down a little and I am sure some form of politicking and talks are going on behind the scenes.'

Mr. Gyampoh thinks this time, Jerry Rawlings played the quintessential patriarchal role. 'If there were things that he thought in his view were not going on well and he has to advice and he chose to do that, I think it was an excellent platform for him to do that. To let everybody know that yes, he is the founder of the party, and as a founder, if things are not going on well, he has every right to draw the attention of the people.'

The NDC appears to have generally acknowledged the patriarchal role Jerry Rawlings played on Thursday. 'If you have a father who sees that something is wrong and he comes out to openly say it, what is wrong with that? We believe in open rebuke, we believe that people need reprimands to straighten their ways,' admits Yaw Boateng Gyan, the national organizer of the NDC.

Apparently, his constant bashing in the past did not sit well with some people in the NDC who hatched many plans to oust him from the party. The popular whistleblower website, Wikileaks in 2009, gave ample evidence of these plans. He has however survived these schemes and is back to the point where he is being looked upon to save the NDC as it faces off with its dreaded opponent-the New Patriotic Party (NPP), in the fast approaching December 7 general elections.

Some NDC optimists, drawing from the goodwill at the Kumasi congress, are certain that the founder will resume his role as the NDC's chief campaigner.

To Campaign Or Not
It is extremely difficult though to bank one's hopes on goodwill or draw any conclusion when it comes to Jerry Rawlings, as his speech was as usual shrouded in metaphors.

'It looks as if Rawlings shrouded his address with some form of uncertainty. He was not speaking directly. Rawlings has always not held a definite position on anything; I keep saying the only consistent thing about JJ Rawlings is the fact that he is consistently inconsistent,' Mr. Gyampoh told DAILY GUIDE .

'Of course, if they try to address some of the genuine concerns that he has raised, I am sure they will be able to appease him to be able to join their ranks, but if they decide to ignore him, then of course you wouldn't expect him to join them on the campaign,' the political scientist notes.

Another political scientist, Kwesi Jonah, acknowledges Jerry Rawlingses indispensability in an NDC campaign trail. 'If people think they can do without Jerry Rawlings, it is a big mistake. Jerry Rawlings still commands substantial supporters,' Mr Jonah told a US-based afrocentric magazine, Africawatch late last year.

Critics have argued that Rawlings would be committing political suicide if he allows himself to be persuaded to join an NDC campaign this time. First of all, in the past, he has been the NDC's chief critic; he is also perhaps the most vocal person condemning NDC to a possible defeat in the elections because of what he attributes to the government's corrupt acts.

In their view, for Mr. Rawlings to make a sudden U-Turn to support the NDC, even though the same elements he has condemned still hold sway in the NDC, will betray an inconsistent trait in him.

Ransford thinks Rawlings has made several U-Turns in the past and if he decides to do another this time, it would not be a big deal. 'He keeps contradicting himself,' he says, citing several metamorphosis of Rawlings since he transformed himself from a brutal military dictator to a relatively savvy democrat.  Mr. Gyampoh is convinced that some underground lobbying could already be in motion within the NDC to reconcile the differences between Rawlings and his arch-enemies in the party. Dr Kpesah White, a political scientist at the University of Ghana, agrees with this possibility.

'Why not, if he decides to do so [campaign for the NDC]. People would criticize him, but as a politician, I know he would always be able to find an answer to those criticisms,' Ransford Gyampoh reasons.

Jerry Rawlings' response to this possibility of joining an NDC campaign leaves even more uncertainty. ”The uncivilized tendency of poking thoughtlessly people who have sacrificed for both party and country, and later attempting to embrace them for political expediency, must stop. Let us begin to show civility towards each other, in the hope that it is not too late,' he said, apparently referring to the yeoman's job he did in the NDC's 2008 rocky campaign that saw it snatching power from the NPP at the time. However, little appreciation was shown to him afterwards.

Rawlings recounted how he personally spearheaded the NDC campaign in 2008 with chagrin. He was personally on the road late in the night, through the bush, rain and heat, while other people who are currently enjoying the goodies of his sweat were sleeping in their hotel rooms during the 2008 campaigns.

'Let us see them also getting a taste of the kind of exercise, some of us have been engaged in from day one,' said a visibly charged Rawlings. 'Those who have been sitting in the comfort of their homes waiting for others to win the elections for them, the time has come for them to also wake up and hit the campaign trail.'

Nevertheless, President John Mahama whose quest for the NDC's presidential candidature succeeded in courting Rawlings to attend the historic delegates' congress, will have a lot of stable-cleaning to do.  Jerry Rawlings acknowledged this challenge for him. 'How much credibility can be restored now before the elections?'

Rawlings spelled out what President Mahama would need to do. 'Electoral victory depends on a number of things; such as how quickly you [John Mahama] can restore integrity to the presidency,' said the NDC patriarch.

  By: Raphael Adeniran.